Artificial receptor layers for detecting chemical and biological threats

When detecting chemical and biological agents in air, the main challenges are selectivity, sensitivity and ruggedness/long-term stability. To the best of our knowledge, we herein report the first fully artificial, selective recognition material for interacting with phosphonate-based warfare agent models. Combined with a quartz crystal microbalance, they yield both selectivity between one another and sensitivity. Increasing the latter is either possible synthetically or in a systems approach by combining them with a pre-concentrator. In contrast to e.g. antibodies, the sensors retain their properties for more than a year. In the case of bioanalyte sensing, we succeeded in generating surface imprints of E.coli leading to label-free rapid detection of these species. In further steps, these principles shall then be transferred to other model organisms. Overall, the approach therefore allows for selective long-term sensing in the way this is required by long-term and on-site monitoring.